Saving Heroin Users With a Nasal Spray

Narcan has been making headlines lately. For those not familiar with it, this new drug helps people who are in the process having an overdose, reversing its effects. In 2014 in the U.S., 18,893 people died from overdoses related to prescription pain medication, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, while an additional 10,574 died from heroin.

Adapt Pharma, a small, private company based in Ireland, began selling Narcan in the U.S. in February. The company is trying to place its product, which has a shelf life of two years, anywhere a potentially fatal overdose could be reversed: private residences, veterans’ hospitals, rehab clinics, jails. In January, Adapt announced it was teaming with the Clinton Foundation to offer a free Narcan kit to every high school in the U.S. With this drug in more and more places like schools, emergency response vehicles, and police cars, this can potentially save someone’s loved one.

$125 for two doses maybe a lot for families on hand when they need it, but they can have a more preventative measure for a fraction of the cost. For less than $20 you can have our testing kits on hand so that you can test your loved one early, before they need something like Narcan. As they say, a good defense is a good offense. By never worrying about how you can test your loved one, you can do it at the first sign of a change in behavior to confirm or deny your suspicions without breaking the bank.